Landlord didn't tell us about work to house - advice please?

clutton_2

""We have every reeason to suspect that he is doing the work now in order to sell in the spring, and that we will be given notice to quit.""

well if you thought that - why on earth did you sign the contract ??

what you also may not know is if the work being done now is the same work as was done before - the neighbour may not know what the Schedule of Works was for the last job - and you also dont know if it is the same builders, same weather condnitions blah blah

i am sorry you will be inconvenienced, but, you have paid the full 6 months in advance (a rather foolish thing to have done anyway) and i dont think you have any legal grounds to ask for a surrender of the tenancy agreement, i strongly suspect that you will have to live with the external works.....

nightsong

clutton wrote: »

""We have every reeason to suspect that he is doing the work now in order to sell in the spring, and that we will be given notice to quit.""

well if you thought that - why on earth did you sign the contract ??

Obviously, we didn't think so at the time.

It doesn't look as if I'm going to get any sensible comments from here on. I thank those posters who have provided helpful or constructive comments. I am quite upset enough about this without negative postings like the one above.

clutton_2

the thing about posting on a public forum is that you will get opinions you will like and opinions you will not like -

i have played devils advocate here and told you what i think your legal position is - i cannot help that you dont like it

Catblue

Even if the work does drag on for months on end, it seems unlikely that you will be disturbed every single day. The painting jobs, for example, should be very quiet. And if the weather is terrible, they probably won't be replacing the roof.

Why don't you have a word with the contractors when they arrive and ask them to let you know in advance if they are going to be doing noisy work right outside your flat? That way you can arrange to be elsewhere if you need to. You say that you are at home all day - do you both work from home? If you need peace and quiet, you can probably work at the local library during the day during the noisier works.

The contractors will be probably be working weekdays only, during working hours, which are the times that most people would see as reasonable. It isn't the contractors' fault or your landlord's fault that you both happen to be at home all day.

I speak as a tenant by the way. If you had bought a home and your neighbour was having an extension built, you'd have just as much noise and mess to put up with. These things are just part of life.

nightsong

OK, I will try one more time ... if anyone cares to respond, may I politely request that you actually read what I have put and try to answer my question rather than just having a go at me.

We took the flat on the understanding that it would be "painted" and this would take "a few weeks".

We now discover that in fact the work will take 10 - 12 weeks minimum, and will be far noisier and more disruptive than we were told originally.

If we had known the truth we would not have taken the flat.

The landlord apperas to have seriously misrepresented the truth.

My question is, do we have any redress?

For some reason most of the posters here would prefer to state the **** obvious, such as telling me that work on houses is noisy and disruptive. Strangely enough I know that already.

Thank you

Jowo_2

Presumably you will be out at work when much of the actual maintenance work takes place?

Consider asking the landlord for a rent reduction to be compensation for the disruption you suffer.

Ask Shelter for confirmation whether you can claim that your tenancy has been frustrated by this essential maintenance work to make the property water-tight and whether there is an obligation, or it is discretionary, whether you are compensated for this work. They provide free expert advice to tenants. Their website also contains info how to take landlords to court.

nightsong

Jowo wrote: »

Presumably you will be out at work when much of the actual maintenance work takes place?

Consider asking the landlord for a rent reduction to be compensation for the disruption you suffer.

Ask Shelter for confirmation whether you can claim that your tenancy has been frustrated by this essential maintenance work to make the property water-tight and whether there is an obligation, or it is discretionary, whether you are compensated for this work. They provide free expert advice to tenants. Their website also contains info how to take landlords to court.

No, as I stated previously we are both at home all day.

However, thank you very much for your helpful advice. I will check out the Shelter website.

Welshwoofs

nightsong wrote: »

We took the flat on the understanding that it would be "painted" and this would take "a few weeks".

It could well have been that the original plan was only to paint. However, it's often the case that once you have someone up the scaffolding to paint, you discover that areas of render have blown or bits of pointing need redoing. That is not something you can know before you get the scaffolding up to start painting.

I can absolutely guarantee you that, unless big bits of render are dropping to the floor, it's impossible to tell if all your render is solid from ground level, by eye.

What I'd also say is that plastering is one of the quiet trades. With the exception of a mixer down at ground-level you'll simply have men with trowels up the scaffolding doing the equivalent of vertical cake icing. Once they start it only takes them a few days BUT all contracts regarding rendering will state that works may be delayed due to weather conditions for the following reasons:

• Water changes the setting time of a rendering mix. It actually sets faster which means it gets harder to apply.
• If it's raining, render will literally be sliding down the walls as fast as it's being put on.
• If you get a frost, it compromises the structure of the render and it'll start cracking and falling off in a few years.

As you've confirmed the works are to do with rendering and the original plan was only to paint, I don't think the LL has gipped you at all. It's simply that the contractors have found more work needs doing

nightsong

Welshwoofs wrote: »

It could well have been that the original plan was only to paint. However, it's often the case that once you have someone up the scaffolding to paint, you discover that areas of render have blown or bits of pointing need redoing. That is not something you can know before you get the scaffolding up to start painting.

I can absolutely guarantee you that, unless big bits of render are dropping to the floor, it's impossible to tell if all your render is solid from ground level, by eye.

What I'd also say is that plastering is one of the quiet trades. With the exception of a mixer down at ground-level you'll simply have men with trowels up the scaffolding doing the equivalent of vertical cake icing. Once they start it only takes them a few days BUT all contracts regarding rendering will state that works may be delayed due to weather conditions for the following reasons:

• Water changes the setting time of a rendering mix. It actually sets faster which means it gets harder to apply.
• If it's raining, render will literally be sliding down the walls as fast as it's being put on.
• If you get a frost, it compromises the structure of the render and it'll start cracking and falling off in a few years.

As you've confirmed the works are to do with rendering and the original plan was only to paint, I don't think the LL has gipped you at all. It's simply that the contractors have found more work needs doing

Thanks for your sensible and professional comments Welshwoofs. I take your point that they may have found more work than they originally thought.

However, even allowing for this, it is a Grade 2 listed property that we now learn has had no proper maintainance for nine years. It must have been perfectly obvious to the owners that extensive work was likely to be needed. There ARE large chunks falling off the garages for example.

HAD WE KNOWN that all this work was going to take place during out tenancy we would have chosen one of the other properties we looked at instead. We could easily have taken a small modern house which would never have left us with all this disruption. My husband suffers with stress and this is very much not what we need.

tizhimi

You have a right to enjoy your property in quiet - whether or not you were told of the extensive works they should not interupt your "enjoyment" of the property. If you were told out right that there was ONLY going to be painting and then all this rendor has fallen off (as houses often do fall apart) I'm not sure how the LL would stand.

If he did nothing and a bit of rendor fell off and hit you on the head he'd be in trouble, if he does the repair work your not happy with the noise and blocking of light as you're a ground floor apartment.

I know this isn't the greatest point to make however the days are getting shorter so the working hours of the builders will be less. I rent a place. If I'd had been told that there was going to be painting and this leads on to months of rendoring, blocking light in my apartment, noise (I am at home all day too as I work from home, this is my "office!") I would be angry too.

Get in touch with Shelter and they can give you some advice in terms of "quiet enjoyment" law whilst renting.

Sorry I can't help any more than that!

Tiz